Cortlandt Receives Approval to Buy Con Edison Property
The Town of Cortlandt received official word last week that its $2.75 million bid to purchase a 99-acre former quarry on Broadway and 11th Street in Verplanck from Con Edison had been approved.
More than a year after Cortlandt officials decided to “stop the buzz” to prevent an unwanted high voltage converter station from coming into its community, the New York State Public Service Commission (PSC) gave the transaction the go-ahead on November 19.
In 2006, Cortlandt attempted to purchase the property, which over the years some trespassers have used to cool off in the summer by diving off cliffs into deep water in what was once used as a rock quarry.
Last year, the Town Board authorized the issuance of a bond for the bulk of the $2.75 price tag. The town has already made a $275,000 down payment.
Cortlandt Supervisor Linda Puglisi said the town was planning to build some all-purpose recreational fields and a walking path on the property, and move the highway, parks, sanitation and water divisions into a new centralized operating department.
To offset the costs of the new complex, Puglisi noted Cortlandt would sell the properties where the departments are currently located throughout the town.
Last year, local officials and residents made passionate pleas to the PSC to reject a proposed high voltage converter station that generates a constant buzzing sound.
West Point Partners was looking to construct a 50-foot-high, 1,000 megawatt high voltage converter station with buried high voltage cables behind Letteri Field on Broadway and 11th Street, the same location where the Spectra/Algonquin Energy natural gas pipeline project will run underground. The pipeline falls under the jurisdiction of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, whose authority supersedes town regulations.
The construction of the station in Verplanck would have enabled the connection of an 80-mile transmission line to the Town of Athens in Greene County.
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